Beaver

There were two beavers in the Biesbosch National Park in the Netherlands. Now there is one. The other one managed to get itself killed by gnawing down a tree and then having the tree fall on top of him.

Splat.

Geography

I needed a German dictionary at the NLS, so I went to the dictionary section. That one is fairly systematically set up. English dictionaries first, then Romance languages (French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian), then Germanic languages (German, Dutch, everything Scandinavian, possibly including Finnish, on one big heap). The next category is interesting: ‘Eastern Europe’.

Linguistically I would oppose to having Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian under ‘Eastern Europe’ but I can see where they’re coming from. Same thing for Georgian and Armenian. I would do it differently, but fair enough. It’s all in Europe and it’s all in the East.

But where was the Basque Country again?

And that institute is supposed to support higher learning? Tsk...

Edinburgh today

A minor challenge for Dick van Dyke?

Polonaise

Polonaise (2002) is one of the better Dutch tv movies of recent years. (IMDB link) It is set in the near future, when traffic jams are so standard that there’s this entire economy built around it. There’s traffic jam radio, a traffic jam dating service, traffic jam hairdressers, etcetera. Hold that thought.

This morning it started to snow and by 10 AM there was quite a nice layer of crispy white snow. It’s even worse back home, I just read about there being 60 traffic jams with a total length of 800 km. (Side-note: the French call 800 km of traffic jams in France ‘black Thursday’, but do consider the relative size of France and the Netherlands and decide who should not complain...)

So I switched on the Dutch radio, and they had sent several reporters to drive into the traffic jams and report on their progress.

That made me think of the movie. And laugh.

How do I loathe thee? Let me count the ways...

Edinburgh is ‘blessed’ with the National Library of Scotland. Words likely fail to express my feelings towards this particular institution, but I shall try anyway.

I have previously described the NLS’s attitude towards their readers along the lines of “Okay, so yes we are a library and as such we should let you touch the books, but if it’s all the same to you, we’d really rather not”. Add to this their ridiculously high prices for photocopying (10p per sheet) and their strict rules for the same – not so much copyright-related but more a matter of not allowing you to bend the spine of the book and then installing photocopiers where the glass plate starts about two inches from the edge so that it is technically impossible to photocopy anything without bending the spine – and there you have my main problems with these Lovely Helpful People.

So today I went in there to read the Geschichte der Sorben (Bautzen: Domowina, 1974–1979). I only ordered volume 1 as I really don’t care how the Sorbians fared under Erich Honecker. Of course they gave me the whole lot, all four heavy volumes of it. Why? No idea.

So I dutifully started reading, and in the back I found some maps. They were on loose sheets and they looked rather helpful: a map of the Sorbian language area around 1500 and one of the same around 1789. (Around, yes.) Time to photocopy!

Of course the bloody photocopier had to jam, as did the one next to it – because an institution like the NLS can’t afford decent equipment, I guess – so the office woman had to come and help. ‘Did you ask permission to photocopy these? No!’ (Said in a very kindergarten-teacher-telling-off-a-four-year-old tone.) The fact that it was only maps that were on loose sheets, that the books may be thirty years old but that surely not more than twenty people will have even THOUGHT of reading them in the past thirty years so that there absolutely is no danger of damaging them, and most of all, the fact that when I walked past that desk there was no one there to ask permission from, didn’t matter.

So here’s the plan:

• The building that is currently being built on Crichton Street car park for Informatics will get a new purpose: an extension of the University Library. They will be connected through an underground corridor (which will also connect all the other buildings on George Square, something that is long overdue).
• All the books from the NLS will be transferred to the University Library, where we have sensible staff and sensible people handling books sensibly. (As opposed to crazy staff being paranoid that sensible people, who are handling books sensibly, will handle books craziliy.)
• We dump the computer geeks in the now-empty NLS building on George IV Bridge.
• Former NLS staff can work at Special Collections with all the old and decaying books that do demand some kind of extra care. Books from 1975 that have never been read before do not belong in this category!

So yeah, tomorrow it’s back to that oh-so researchers-friendly library to see how my Sorbian friends were doing after the German Farmers’ Revolts.

Porridge oats

‘Allergy advice: contains oats.’

Really?

Lazy day

Okay, so I did do two loads of laundry, and the dishes, and I vacuumed my room and the hallway, but other than that: I did nothing. The plan to go out and walk up the Crags or take the lift up to the roof terrace of the museum was cancelled, as the weather wasn’t as nice as the past couple of days. Much cloudier, so less vision. Too bad.

The vacuum cleaner tore my headset to pieces, so I’m skypeless for the moment. At least we know our vacuum cleaner is effective.

I’ve started so I’ll finish

The Scottish Society for Northern Studies had their annual conference in David Hume Tower today. The theme of the day was Hermann Pálsson, the late Icelandic academic. There was an obituary by Magnús Magnússon of Mastermind fame, who disappointed me by not using his signature phrase “I’ve started so I’ll finish”. Instead he quoted from Hávamál:

Deyr fé, deyja frændur
Deyr sjálfur ið sama
En orðstír deyr aldregi
Hveim er sér góðan getur

Then a lecture by someone whose name I can’t spell on vicious women in Laxdæla saga who invoke a fight between their two lovers and make sure the fight will last until Ragnarok. After lunch a nice lecture on place names with ‘eið’ in the North Atlantic, by Doreen Waugh. I promised her a copy of my map of the Faroes to get some data from there. Then the boring AGM, for which I had to stay, because...

They had an essay contest which I entered... and won! So I got an envelope with a nice cash prize, plus the essay will be published in the next issue of Northern Studies, to appear early 2006.

In the words of L.G.: BOUNCE!

Summarizing...

Okay, so I left it that late that I wasn’t even logged on automatically anymore. Here’s a summary of the past couple of weeks; it doesn’t have much depth but I may elaborate on some things later on. Or I may not.

New Scotland-related stuff
Dance was nice. Seems like ages ago. I learned proper calling and put it to the test last Thursday. The big test is in two weeks when I’m not calling a shite-easy Montgomeries’ Rant but the bugger Midnight Oil. Pleasance booking took seven hours and everyone present agreed that the system does not make sense. C.I. forgot to go to Treasurer’s Training. This is dumb, but not a real disaster. We have a hall for the Annual, but no date or band. Yet.

University-related stuff
I am too nice. Or so L.v.B. said. In other words, I had to re-mark the EL1 Class Test. Not happy, but hey, what can you do. Tutorials otherwise are going fine, although first-year students continue to be painfully apathic. Research is good as well, I came across some really good books on language, ethnic identity and state formation. And stuff. And all the people are in Scotland!

Other stuff
F.M. had a birthday party. She had a chocolate fountain. Wow. I will be getting a book for my graduation (was within budget, mom said). I still think they should translate more good books to English, like this one. Had a conversation with M.M. yesterday about the hows and whys of the xenophobic British book market. J.B.’s birthday party tonight. T.T. is going to Z.S.’s followers’ gathering, M.G. is wondering whether to go or not.

Geez, my life is monotonous.